Continuing our threads that lend insight on recent design changes, we will be sharing some of our Annihilation/Watchman design philosophies and offering perspectives from our extensive internal testing of the new Annihilation/Watchman rotation.

Annihilation/Watchman Rotation Design Philosophy:

A Responsive and Reactive Rotation: Following our design philosophy of making the Annihilation/Watchman Discipline the most challenging and potentially rewarding Marauder/Sentinel Discipline to play and player feedback that the current Live Annihilation/Watchman Discipline is “boring,” “predictable,” and “easy to play,” we have designed the new rotation to require the use of a varying priority system, rather than a predetermined rotation that fits neatly within some set duration of time, in order to maximize damage output. Players will need to rethink how the rotation plays and respond carefully to each situation to get the most out of the new Annihilation/Watchman Discipline. This design lends itself to a visceral playstyle, which will see a successful Marauder/Sentinel reacting instinctively to each combat situation as it arises. This playstyle should appeal to players that prefer variance over predictability in their combat experiences.

Never Underestimate Force Rend/Force Melt: From the beginning, Force Rend/Force Melt was designed to be a longer-lasting, damage-heavy DoT ability, and this has not changed with the new rotation design. Force Rend/Force Melt packs quite a prolonged punch and feeds your Rage/Focus regeneration and self healing. Making sure that it is active on any targets that will last for 15 or more seconds is essential to maximizing damage output. Due to its longer duration, it is also an easier DoT spread than Rupture/Cauterize.

Never Overestimate Dual Saber Throw/Twin Saber Throw: Some abilities are only designed to be used situationally. For example, as an Annihilation Marauder/Watchman Sentinel, you are only intended to use Dual Saber Throw/Twin Saber Throw in multi-target situations, while its damage is boosted by Pulverize/Mind Sear, and/or when stuck at a long distance from your enemy target.

As I already said, with this change you'll need to up the resource generation and, perhaps, buff the Searing Sabre passive. The latter is my wish ONLY. But in a priority system, you are going to need to do something about resources or the damage IS GOING to SUFFER.

Anyhow, I personally like what you are doing. It'dbe better(imo) if Cauterise ticked twice(every 3s) during the 6s. It'd dominate every other DoT in damage per interval that way. A thing it should do imo.

"I am not in this for politics, nor the wanton destruction, hell not even for credits. I have chosen this way of life because of the hunt and because it was pushed onto me on some ugly slimeball called a "pearl" and Honour bound me to this path ever onwards" Caelestinus

Making Annihilation/watchman the most difficult and most rewarding discipline doesn't seem to fit with a dot spec discipline. You want to make it reactive and needing to monitor the effect of the dots and reach to them rather than have a rotation.

However that doesn't seem to work with what players of annihilation want or with their play style. I don't personally play this discipline but from the feed back nobody seems happy with what you are doing.

Rather than have a dot spec class as the one that requires the player to be most reactive make it one of the fast paced disciplines the one that requires the player to react to the situation. Combat/Carnage fills this roll well with gore and fast paced attacks with vicious throw and devastating blast rather than managing dots in some way to make that reactive.

It appears as it stands you are trying to force a round peg into a square hole which nobody wants.

You guys are playing this class all wrong. First part of the rotation is instead of clicking play when you get to the character screen, you hit DELETE. Then you create a new character that is a Bounty Hunter/Trooper.

A Responsive and Reactive Rotation: Following our design philosophy of making the Annihilation/Watchman Discipline the most challenging and potentially rewarding Marauder/Sentinel Discipline to play and player feedback that the current Live Annihilation/Watchman Discipline is “boring,” “predictable,” and “easy to play,” we have designed the new rotation to require the use of a varying priority system, rather than a predetermined rotation that fits neatly within some set duration of time, in order to maximize damage output. Players will need to rethink how the rotation plays and respond carefully to each situation to get the most out of the new Annihilation/Watchman Discipline. This design lends itself to a visceral playstyle, which will see a successful Marauder/Sentinel reacting instinctively to each combat situation as it arises. This playstyle should appeal to players that prefer variance over predictability in their combat experiences.

Did you really just say you want a rotation that plays like Pre-3.0 Watchman, yet you don't want to implement pre-3.0 Watchman. Because that is *********** hilarious.

Continuing our threads that lend insight on recent design changes, we will be sharing some of our Annihilation/Watchman design philosophies and offering perspectives from our extensive internal testing of the new Annihilation/Watchman rotation.

Did your internal testing show the proposed changes represent a significant DPS loss?

Player PTS testing and modeling showed the changes you are looking to implement result in a significant DPS loss compared the the live version of the Discipline.

Quote:
Originally Posted by JohnJarynowski

Never Overestimate Dual Saber Throw/Twin Saber Throw: Some abilities are only designed to be used situationally. For example, as an Annihilation Marauder/Watchman Sentinel, you are only intended to use Dual Saber Throw/Twin Saber Throw in multi-target situations, while its damage is boosted by Pulverize/Mind Sear, and/or when stuck at a long distance from your enemy target.

This reality further reduces our DPS as a buffed DST/TST is one of our top damaging abilities even in single target damage.

How do these changes reconcile with the stated goals of the Discpline here?

Annihilation/Watchman: High Rotation Difficulty, High Sustained and Low Burst Damage

We are no longer the highest sustained damage spec; Combat/Carnage will surpass us. And, the changes to the DoT durations were meant to increase our burstyness.

OK, that's the extent of civility I can manage right now...

Read on for my raging rant:

Spoiler

This is f***ing stupid. Your philosophy is at such odds with the what the forum community desires. The community widely asked for a 2.10 playstyle which featured a proc-based Rupture/Cauterize. Incidentally, this was "...the most challenging and potentially rewarding..." playstyle people wanted, not the f***cked up cacophony of chaos that 3.2.1 is. This is without a doubt the most insulting and irritating yellow post I have ever read on the forums.

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The statements and opinions expressed on these websites are solely those of their respective authors and do not necessarily reflect the views, nor are they endorsed by Bioware, LucasArts, and its licensors do not guarantee the accuracy of, and are in no way responsible for any content on these websites.